Loving Through Humility

We find true, lasting, limitless power in love.  Those who serve become great.  However, if we raise ourselves above others, we will be lowered.  Yet if we lower ourselves, we will be raised up.  As we bow before others, we are empowered to lift others up.  Thus, if we are humble, we will love our neighbor as ourselves.*  

And so in today's Gospel reading, we hear that Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples, saying 

The greatest among you must be your servant.  Whoever exalts himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.**  

The greatest one among us has served us, and has served us better than anyone else.  Jesus came to serve.***  He taught us The Word in all He said and did, and thus in His great love for us, He showed us that He is The Way, The Truth and The Life.****  He has loved us so much that He was obedient even unto death, death on a cross,***** so that we would be saved from our sins.  

If we too wish to be great, then we too must serve.  A servant is not greater than his master.******  We should not expect to be greater than Jesus.  When hardship befalls us, we should remember that we too are expected to suffer, just as Jesus suffered and died for us.  We are to die to ourselves so we can live for our neighbor, just as Jesus died for us.  

Essentially, we are called to consent to being humbled, just as Jesus gave His assent to His Heavenly Father humbling Him.  We are called to humility.  

Here we are not presented with easy work.  Our egos tend to get in the way.  I am reminded of an interaction someone related to me.  A young woman I know very well described how she was standing in a busy cafe.  A middle-aged woman who appeared impoverished was also standing at the counter in the process of ordering an item.  This older woman kept glancing nervously at a shopping cart loaded with personal items, which was stationed just outside the cafe.  The young woman gestured to the older woman and the merchandise she wanted.  The younger woman altruistically offered, "I'll get that for you."  

The older woman immediately and indignantly rebuffed the younger woman's generous offer, scoffing, "Oh, no, you won't!"  The younger woman was surprised and silently backed away.  The older woman seemed like she was too proud to accept help from someone else.  

Yet if we raise ourselves up, sooner or later we will be humbled.  At some point we will realize that we need others to help us.  The twentieth century Trappist monk Thomas Merton pointed out that "no man is an island."  If we isolate ourselves, we cannot survive.  

Yet if we acknowledge our weakness, we embrace the reality of our own humanity.  When we admit that we need others, we see the true nature of being human.  Jean Vanier, founder of the L'Arche residential communities for intellectually disabled persons, has noted, "If we deny our weakness and the reality of death, if we want to be strong and powerful always, we deny a part of our being, we live an illusion...  To be human is to be bonded together, each with our weaknesses and strengths, because we need each other.  

When we admit our needs, we are humble, since we are seeing ourselves as we really are.  If we acknowledge that we must rely on each other, we touch the reality of life.  

Otherwise we are destined for disaster, to have no peace.  Saint Teresa of Calcutta has explained, "If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other."  When we proudly insist on being completely independent of all others, we are setting ourselves up for ruin.  

However, we are set and ready to aid others if we but humble ourselves.  We witness this truth in the lives of many saints over the course of millenia.  Saint Anthony of Egypt, a great saint who was considerably sanctified during his life on earth in the third and fourth centuries, saw in a revelation numerous spiritual snares laid out in front of him.  It seemed that no matter where he would step, he was going to get caught and fall.  He prayed to God, asking Him what could possibly get him through such treacherous terrain.  He was told that with humility, he could successfully traverse such hazardous spiritual landscape.  

Saint Anthony lived for decades as a monk in the Egyptian desert.  He survived on what people brought to him.  Upon his consenting to his being so humbled, God greatly blessed Saint Anthony.  Through him God healed those who came to him.  

Once Saint Anthony had given his assent to being humbled, in effect he had agreed to let God use him as an instrument to heal others in the world, to kindle others' faith in God.  When a person, such as Saint Anthony, or like our Blessed Mother Mary, obediently acquiesces and submits to the will of God, God will utilize that person, helping others through her, since she has become an appropriate vehicle for positive change in the world due to her humility.  

At the time we may view humbling circumstances as embarrassing and demoralizing, but if we have faith in God, in time we come to realize that God will work wonders through such apparent misfortune.  Through our hardships we can come to better understand the difficulties others suffer, and thus we can become better equipped to help them.  

Thus the fifteenth century monk and priest Thomas a Kempis wrote that 

It often happens that after great consolation there comes profound desolation, or troublesome temptation, or bodily unease, or aggravation on the part of men, or loss of friends, or attacks of the enemy, or disturbance of soul, or derision from children or reproof from elders, or harsh correction by superiors.  All these are designed to humble the pride in our hearts, so that we might have compassion on those who are ill as well as on those who are tempted and troubled.  

When calamity strikes, understandably we feel overwhelmed.  However, we are not offered pointless agony when we encounter catastrophes.  If we look by the light of faith, that light by which God seeks to illumine the path before us, we can see that a deeper meaning rests below the surface of the apparent misfortune which has befallen us.  

In the midst of the adversity we face, and the greater understanding we are being given of others' suffering, we are being trained to comprehend others' plight, we are being led to be more compassionate, and thus to better love our neighbor.  How do we respond to such invitations from God?  Do we become angry at God?  Or do we realize that God is inviting us to open our hearts in the midst of trials and tribulations, so that, through intense pain, we can learn to love with greater hearts?  

In effect, when we find ourselves in the midst of humbling circumstances, in how we respond, we are faced with the question on which we will be judged for all of the choices we make in our entire lives.  When we are presented with chances to be humbled amidst afflictions, it really comes down to the question, are we going to choose to love?  

* Matthew 22:39; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27; Leviticus 19:18; Romans 13:9; Galatians 5:14 

** Matthew 23:11-12; Matthew 20:26; Luke 14:11; Luke 18:14  
*** Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45; Luke 22:27; John 13:1-15  

**** John 14:6 

***** Philippians 2:8 

****** John 15:20